complete newbie to the wonderful world of fabric, calligraphy and crochet

Roman Blinds with Lauren Guthrie

I feel the need to justify myself sometimes, especially my hobbies. Although I lean towards creating pretty clothes, I thought it would go down better at home if at first I learnt something more practical! I’ve always loved the effect of roman blinds but they’re just so damn expensive (and rightly so, just out of my budget), so this seemed a good place to start. Particularly when I found out one of the ladies I’d been extensively blog stalking had a workshop doing just that and it would mean I get to visit her beautiful shop!

I had previously had an attempt at these blinds, thinking I could whip one up for my au pair before she arrived… hmmm suffice it to say I was at Dunelm buying curtains the day before!!! Not as simple as the You Tube tutorials looked.

So on Valentine’s Day I tootled off to Birmingham, much more nervous than I had anticipated, and attended the roman blind workshop. It was a fabulous workshop from start to finish and it turns out they are quite simple to make you just need a good teacher! This is my mini blind

I’m now working on some blinds for my living room, a slightly larger project as the main window is nearly 2 metres wide! Pattern matching was a bit of an issue but will blog about that in the next post. I am determined to succeed.

I even managed to take a quick selfie with the lovely Lauren Guthrie

A bonus to an already lovely day was meeting Jane who had this adorable needle case with her. Apparently it was made for her quite some years ago by her teenage babysitter! Isn’t it adorable, I would love to have a try to recreate this, maybe with some cherries on the front?